--forgetful that the room was now growing all bright with
daybreak. At this moment the clock striking in the hall below made him
start.

Hastily he took out a paper that he had hid somewhere about him. It
was in his own handwriting, all sealed and endorsed. "Not to be opened
except in case of my death." Nevertheless he tore it open--tore likewise
an under-cover addressed to his wife, and began to read:

"I know you never loved me. From something I overheard on our
marriage-day--from other words afterwards let fall in anger by my
brother, I also know that you loved"--

He crushed the paper, his eyes seeming literally to flame. Then all the
fury died out of them, and left nothing but tenderness. He listened for
the soft breathing within--soft and pure.

"No!" he murmured. "I will not leave her honour to the chance of written
words. No other human being must ever know what I knew. If I live, it
is not worse than it was before; and should any harm come to me, let her
think I died in ignorance. Better so."

He tore the paper into small strips, and deliberately burnt them one
by one in the candle, making a little pile of the ashes, but afterwards
scattering them about the fireplace. Then putting out the light--for
the house was now filled with the soft grey dawn--Nathanael stepped once
more into his wife's room.

And still she was sleeping--sleeping at the very crisis of her fate. Her
face was composed and sweet, though her hands were still clenched, and
one of them almost buried in her loose hair.

Her husband stood and looked at her, trying long to keep himself firm
and self-restrained, as though she were aware of his presence. But at
last the holy helplessness of sleep subdued him. From standing upright
he sank gradually down--down--till he was crouching on his knees.
Shudder over shudder came over him--sigh after sigh rose up, and was
smothered again in his breast. At last even the strong man's strength
gave way, and there fell a heavy, silent, burning rain.

And all the while the wife slept, and never knew how he loved her!

After a while this ceased. Nathanael opened his eyes and tried to look
once more calmly on his wife. She stirred a little in sleep, and began
to smile--a very soft, meek, innocent smile, that softened her lips into
infantine sweetness. She was again Agatha, the merry Agatha, as she had
been when he first saw her, before he wooed her, and shook her roughly
from her girlish calm into all the